Tuesday, October 2, 2012

The Nevadan, 1950

Randolph Scott plays a greenhorn in the opening scenes of
this 1950s western, and his act is convincing enough to the shady characters
who inhabit this scenic stretch of what is supposed to be Nevada. We first see
him in a three-piece suit and narrow-brim hat, with a manner too ingenuous to
be what he seems. Giving up his clothes at gunpoint to swap outfits with an
escaped criminal (Forrest Tucker), he begins to look more familiar.

When he rides a bucking saddle horse without being thrown, it’s
clear to the rest of the men that he’s no ordinary greenhorn. Decking himself
out in store-bought duds and a western hat, he becomes the handsome hero we
know from a score or more of his westerns. It takes the others in the movie quite a
while longer to discover his actual identity.

Plot. The item on
the props list that moves all the action is $250,000 in gold hidden by robbers
somewhere in the snow-peaked mountains. Tucker, the one robber who
knows where to find the loot, escapes from a law officer escorting him to
prison. A saloon operator (George Macready) is after Tucker for the gold and
employs several goons to do the necessary dirty work.

Swapping clothes, Forrest Tucker and Randolph Scott

That includes getting Macready’s alcoholic partner (Tom
Powers) bumped off, and when Scott gets involved, having his men beat
him unconscious. Macready’s daughter (a young Dorothy Malone) meets Scott
as she sells him a horse at her father’s ranch. She takes a shine to him when
he tells her she seems “pretty sure of herself.”

Malone eventually shifts her allegiance to Scott during the
course of the film, as she confronts her father for being greedy and a
miserable husband to her mother. When he slaps her down for defying him, he
doesn’t do much to get on her good side either.

Scott joins Tucker in an uneasy alliance as they band
together against Macready. Macready’s chief henchman (Jock Mahoney) tries to
supervise the feisty Malone, but she gets away from him.

Dorothy Malone, Randolph Scott

There follows a trek into the mountains as Tucker and
Scott head into the high country to get the gold, while Macready and two brothers
(Frank Faylen and Jeff Corey) follow them. In a standoff outside an abandoned
mine shaft, the villains get picked off one by one.

Matters aren’t resolved, however, until Tucker learns why
Scott has become his partner, and a furious fight ensues inside the old mine,
which begins to collapse around them. When all is said and done, Scott has
delivered Tucker back into the hands of the law, and Malone, still pretty sure
of herself, says Scott will be back some day--to get his horse.

Randolph Scott and Jock Mahoney

Parallels. The story
is structured in a way that plays out some ideas about partners. There are
three sets of partners in the film. Scott and Tucker make one pair, as they
work together to retrieve the gold, neither fully trusting the other. “Don’t
ever turn your back on a partner,” Tucker tells Scott.

Macready and Powers have been business partners for many
years, before Macready decides that Powers is expendable and gets him into a
fatal ambush. Also of interest is the bond between the two brothers, Faylen and
Corey. Though they bicker and quarrel, they are dead loyal to each other. When
Faylen is mortally wounded, he dies in the arms of the emotionally stricken
Corey.

Forrest Tucker

Wrapping up. The
film was shot in color and standard ratio in the Alabama Hills of Lone Pine,
California, which accounts for the backdrop of snow-capped Sierras. Director
Gordon Douglas made scores of movies over four decades in Hollywood, including
several westerns: Fort Dobbs (1958), Yellowstone Kelly (1959) and Rio Conchos (1964). Earlier in his career, he’d directed numerous
Our Gang shorts and, during the
war, a series of Great Guildersleeve features.

Frank Faylen

Randolph Scott was surrounded in the film by no small amount
of talent. Dorothy Malone was at the beginning of a career that would include
starring roles in many films, as well as one of the central characters in TV’s
long running serial, Peyton Place (1964-1968).

In the 1950s, Forrest Tucker was a B-film performer,
appearing in westerns and action films before eventually joining the cast of
the TV series, F Troop (1965-1967).
George Macready, a Shakespearean actor, with a long screen career playing villains,
also would be a continuing character on Peyton Place.

Jeff Corey

Character actors Frank Faylen and Jeff Corey each appeared
in over 200 film and TV roles. Faylen is remembered as the father of TV’s Dobie
Gillis (1959-1963). Corey, an actor’s actor, was active in the controversial
Federal Theater Project in the 1930s and, after distinguished service during
WWII, was called before the HUAC, refused to testify, and was blacklisted for a
decade. During that time he developed a following as an acting teacher and
coach for the likes of James Dean, Jack Nicholson, Kirk Douglas, and many others.

The Nevadan is
currently available at amazon. For more of Tuesday’s Overlooked Films, click on
over to Todd Mason’s blog.

6 comments:

I see from my notes in Brian Garfield's WESTERN FILMS, that I last saw this back in 2004 and enjoyed it alot. Time to view it again, maybe today with dinner and a couple beers. Randolph Scott is just about my favorite western actor.